Anchorage F is located just outside the bay from the Panama Canal Yacht Club. It is the staging area for all pleasure boats where the Canal Advisors are dropped off aboard each vessel. We dropped anchor there at six pm with the last rays of daylight. At eight we'd welcome our Advisor and proceed to the Gatun Locks, the first three of a set of six that were constructed one hundred years before to ferry seagoers from one great ocean to another. We would complete the Gatun set, be placed overnight at a mooring in Lake Gatun, the freshwater lough between the seas, and complete the transit the following morning. As we drifted into the anchorage we spotted the Ummagumma, Sergio's thirty five foot steel hull hovering on the placid surface of the water. We hailed our transit partners, who asked if we had any new updates. "Yes," Brian shouted, "they won't take us till midnight!" "WHAT!?!" "Hehe! Eight o'clock, nothing new." We'd learned to play off of Sergio's nervous apprehensions. I'm sure he appreciated it once his heart migrated back down into his chest.
It was twenty minutes after eight when the Advisors' launch sped over. Ummagumma had been doing lazy circles around us ("Hey Surge! Watch our anchor line!") since five to the hour so we were immensely gladdened when the first Advisor was dropped off with them. Our guy, a friendly, outgoing Panamanian named Jorge, hopped aboard expertly. "Hola!" he cried, "Welcome to the Panama Canal! Get your anchor up and your engine going! OK, who's the captain?" I introduced myself and the crew. "Great boat," he commented, "you know, I've got the record for the smallest boat to transit � 24 feet! You guys will be fine! How fast can you take her?" "Seven knots," I confirmed. His brows shot up. "Seven? That little boat, it could only do four. But I still got her through in 16 hours. This was back when they still let everyone do the Canal in a day. Not so hard when you can tie up to the other boat (one that can do 10!). They all asked me how I did it....well, it's our secret, ok?" He winked, "we'll probably be rafting with the Ummagumma � you're going to love this � they do all the work! You don't have to lift a line! We tie up together, fit Faith to Ummagumma's center, and the lines just go right around you!"
WHEW!! So our ratty, decrepit lines would not have to serve, after all! Let me give you the skinny on a PC transit: Take a small boat!!
We raced off in the wake of Sergio and crew, toward the great, black gates of the first lock. Jorge confirmed by radio that we would indeed be rafting through on their beam, then gathered us all 'round. "Now," he began, "usually I take big ships through. You guys, let�s keep in mind: you call this a yacht, a sailboat, a ship. But," he held one finger in the air significantly, "let's remember what you really are: a pleasure boat. That means," he paused and we leaned in, attentive as if our very existence might depend on the information he was about to impart, which it very well might. "That means," he repeated for greater effect, "that this is a boat for fun. Let's remember this at all times: WE WILL HAVE FUN! Relax! Keep an eye out for each other and the other boat, and everything will be fine! Hahaha!" The smiles on our faces lit the water around for a hundred yards.
Faith pulled up alongside Ummagumma, lines were tossed, and the raft made. "One boat," said Jorge, "make them fast like one boat." We waited on a Liberian freighter to move into position in the lock, ahead of us. Then the two sailboats entered the first lock. Far above us, on the tops of the lock walls like sentries on a castle parapet, the Canal workers stared down at us. At a signal from the Advisors they began to spin wicked looking monkey-fists � hard, rubber balls attached to thin lines for the retrieval of the thick ropes we'd use to maintain position as the lock was inundated. Two monkey-fists per side came whizzing overhead. These things are legendary. They can knock you unconscious into the water. They have been know to break porthole glass, rip through a bivy, put permanent dents in steel. Purportedly, the throwers don't do these things on purpose. These guys were experts. The toss comes from seventy feet above, about a hundred to the side. There was an obvious method to the throw � swing the monkey-fist in a widening circle on the end of its line, cross the body in a speed-building arc, back to the other side too quickly for vision to register and ZOOM! comes the rubber missile. The two on the Ummagumma's starboard went directly ahead and behind the stern and bow stays, respectively. We were rafted to her port, and the bow directed monkey-fist found its home truly. The stern throw went inches wide, plopping into the water just behind Sergio's boat. The next attempt, moments later, would come at us, I reasoned. I roused the crew � "look alive, mates! When that thing comes in get it around our stern and into their hands!" Sure enough, the second attempt left nothing in question: the little rocket trampolined off our canopy and came to rest aboard the Ummagumma amidships. Eric hauled it back and leaped to the stern, passing the line around our back stay to the waiting hands of the other crew. The Canal lines were tied to the retrieval lines, pulled up by the throwers, and fixed to the bollards above. Then it was up to the line handlers aboard our sistership to control our position.
The locks are all filled using freshwater from Lake Gatun. Fifty million gallons per transit are poured into the steel and concrete cribs, lifting and dropping vessels as small as Faith, or as large as a Panamac � the largest ship capable of fitting into the "narrow" confines of the 1,100 by 175 foot locks (they have about a foot and a half to spare on each beam). For the first lock this means mixing fresh and salt water, from below. As the fresh water dumps into the salt the fusion stirs tumultuously, and many a boat has been slammed up against the wall, its neighbors, or in a few cases its crew, as the mad admixture tries desperately to find a congenial medium. We were prepared for the worst, ready to fend (pun intended) for our lives. The boils began to appear as the flooding began, roils of spumy fluid rising dome-like on the surface above the grated floodgates forty feet below our keel. "My God!", I thought. "The least of the Mississippi eddies tops this by a huge margin!" Eric flashed me a secretive smile. "See," he said, "a monkey on crack could handle this."
Well, crack-addled monkeys or not, the crew of the Ummagumma handled it like pros. We watched the water rise until we could have stormed the castle walls by stepping over them. The throwers now assumed their next role as transitioners, removing the lines from the bollards and walking them forward as we put our engines to their task, skating directly into the second lock. Here there was no mixing of mediums, and the rising began almost imperceptibly. Sergio began to truly enjoy himself. "Sean!" he called. I whipped around from staring at the top of the lock, the stars above and the waters below, instantly attentive to the other captains voice. "Take my camera? I'd like some pictures if you don't mind? If you're not too busy or anything?"
No problem! I jumped around the Faith, trying to get every angle possible with all of the Ummagumma's crew at their work. Serge was especially happy when I took special care to take a couple of shots of Caroline at the bow heaving away to keep our vessels in the middle of the lock. "That was sweet of you," he glowed as I handed the camera back. You're welcome Serge � Caroline is easy on the lens!
Second lock completed, we propelled our vessels into the last chamber. Lock three was a shorter lift than the previous two. At the pinnacle, level with Lake Gatun, we all cheered as the Panama Canal Authority building came into view. It marked the zenith of our transition from the Atlantic side. Once the gates ahead opened and the freighter made its exit we detached from our sistership and sped out onto the open waters of the lake, black silhouette of jungle laden shore interspersed with fluorescent light where the few roads made a twist near the waters edge. The Milky Way blazed, yes, blazed overhead. The North Star could be seen just barely cresting the hills; as low on the horizon as I have ever seen it. In the south the grand Southern Cross stood like a sword thrust into the terra firma. Jorge directed us to the floating tie off where we'd spend the night. "Adios amigos!" He shouted from the deck of the launch that retrieved him. "You'll be fine, and remember, have FUN!" Adios Jorge! Have no worries!